ABL crowns co-champs

Aug. 10, 2007

By Jeremiah Bartz/ Frontiersman

PALMER - The verdict is in, and the Mat-Su Miners can finally call themselves co-champions of the Alaska Baseball League.

On Wednesday, ABL president Shawn Maltby decided to allow the Miners, a squad that finished tied for first in the league with a 24-11 record, to be recognized as league champs, alongside the AIA Fire, the squad that claimed to be the sole owner of the ABL title.

The controversy started last week after the Mat-Su Miners and Athletes in Action Fire each ended the 2007 season with identical 24-11 records. AIA took ownership of the title, citing the better record in seven games of head-to-head competition against the Miners.

But when Mat-Su general manager Pete Christopher looked at the league bylaws, he saw that rules state the head-to-head tiebreaker is only used when multiple teams are seeking the league's lone berth to the National Baseball Congress World Series.

But for a variety of reasons, mainly cost, AIA and Mat-Su both opted not to go to the World Series held annually in Wichita, Kan.

The third-place Peninsula Oilers went instead.

With both teams having not gone to Wichita, Christopher asked for his team to be recognized alongside AIA as league champs.

&#8220We've got the best league record, so why can't we be called league champions?” Mat-Su general manager Pete Christopher said last week. &#8220Why not co-champions?”

On Wednesday, Christopher was happy his club was finally recognized as a champion, but frustrated with the controversy that involved the team up until a week after the season.

&#8220The players deserve to be recognized as co-champions,” Christopher said.

Controversy seemed to be a theme for the final stretch of the 2007 season.

AIA scored a pair of victories, some call questionable, during the final two days of the season.

The Fire improved to 23-11 after receiving a forfeit victory against Peninsula. The Fire and the Oilers played into the 17th inning on July 31, but the game was suspended due to darkness.

ABL rules state suspended games must be made up the next day. But the Oilers were due to leave to Wichita, and could not make up the

game.

On Aug. 1 in the season finale, AIA beat an Anchorage Glacier Pilots squad that was missing six players.

&#8220One they won by forfeit - I wish they would have been able to play the next day - and then they played a depleted team,” Christopher said.

The Miners now have won at least a share of the league title twice in the last four years. Mat-Su earned the title outright in 2004.

Contact Frontiersman sports editor Jeremiah Bartz at sports@frontiersman.com.